Bangladesh: School classrooms get high-tech makeover

Dhaka - Tens of thousands of primary and secondary school children across Bangladesh are to go online from their desktops through a nationwide programme bringing new technology to school classrooms.

About 80,000 children, aged 11 to 15 years, will receive tuition in multimedia classrooms equipped with a laptop, projector, speakers and internet connectivity as a result of a joint effort by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Government of Bangladesh.

The joint effort to spread information access throughout Bangladesh’s education system has so far brought multimedia classrooms to about 1,000 schools with an additional 22,000 secondary schools going online within two years, and 60,000 primary schools within five years.

In the capital, Dhaka, five multimedia classrooms and a computer laboratory with 25 computers have been installed in Agroni School and College giving students an opportunity to learn from computer-generated tables, graphics and maps.

“Nowadays we can find all the latest information on the Internet,” said Gazi Sallaudin Sidikki, a teacher at Agroni. “We are using the Internet to download images, video and animation and creating content for use in class. This makes student learning more complete.”